Zuckerberg slams Apple's Tim Cook's comments on Facebook as 'extremely glib'

Kimberly White/Reuters

• Mark Zuckerberg fired back at Tim Cook after the Apple CEO criticized Facebook amid a burgeoning scandal around the company's data practices and its role in political campaigns.
• Cook said Apple was better off for charging its customers and not selling them to advertisers, saying that privacy was a human right.
• But Zuckerberg said Cook's comments were "extremely glib," and as a free service, Facebook does care about its users while companies like Apple that charge can't argue that they care.

Mark Zuckerberg fired back at Tim Cook after the Apple CEO criticized Facebook amid a burgeoning scandal around the company's data practicies and its role in political campaigns.

Cook said that "privacy to us is a human right" and a "civil liberty," and ultimately, because Facebook is a free service, the users become the products that are then sold to advertizers, something he thinks Apple is better off for not doing.

But on Vox's "The Ezra Klein Show" podcast, Zuckerberg pointedly dismissed Cook's ideas about Facebook.

"You know, I find that argument, that if you're not paying that somehow we can't care about you, to be extremely glib. And not at all aligned with the truth," said Zuckerberg.

Zuckerberg contended Facebook's mission of connecting the world means it has to provide service to those who can't pay, and that advertising naturally lends itself to the business model, but that Facebook still cares about individuals and their rights.

Instead, Zuckerberg challenged how a company like Apple, that does charge its users, can argue that it cares about its customers.

"If you want to build a serivce which is not just serving rich people, then you need to have something people can afford," said Zuckerberg.

"I think it's important that we don't all get Stockholm Syndrome, and let the companies that work hard to charge you more, convince you that they actually care more about you. Because that sounds ridiculous to me," said Zuckerberg.